


pain is inevitable (suffering is optional)

by ryangosling (ryanreynolds)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Mentions of other characters - Freeform, Post 2x23
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 17:59:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,344
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8219990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ryanreynolds/pseuds/ryangosling
Summary: All that power, all that speed, and yet his father lies six feet under the ground. What was the point of it all if he could not save the most important person of his life?What do you do when everything is lost?You find it again.





	

His dad was killed, murdered in front of him and they ask if he’s alright.

They lower his dad’s body into the ground, hug him as if they are waiting for him to break. His shoulders shake, tears fall from his red eyes; but he does not break, he does not fall. They do not deserve to see his destruction.

They leave him behind on the graveyard, in front of both his parents' gravestones, "to grieve alone" they whisper as they leave hurriedly. They hope that he will be alright, they say, when he returns and he nods. He is alright, he's sad, of course, but he's ready to take on Zoom. They smile at him, but their smiles are empty and he frowns a little.

"You're not fine," they try to tell him and he wants to scream and yell at them, that of course, he's not fine. But he will be. When Zoom is dead, which is why they have to get to work now. They have to figure out how to kill him, for if that monster roams the city for one second longer; he's going to break.

It's like they don't understand, that he has no one left. It's like they think that _they_ are enough, that they _should_ be enough for him. They don't seem to understand that there is a void inside of him that can never be filled, for he has nothing anymore. Friends mean a lot, love means even more; but family is the most important, and his was _murdered_. Right in front of him, his parents' deaths were meant as motivation for him to get faster so villains could benefit from him.

And because they don't understand - he gets that now, that they think, they are enough for him, they are enough to keep him sane - they lock him up. They confine him and his speed in a cell meant for traitors and people that can't be trusted. Because they don't trust him, "to take care" of himself, as if he means anything. He is meaningless without his family and with Zoom still living. 

They lock him up, separate him from his revenge. They lock him up, and leave him like all those villain scums they fought against.

They lock him up like he was Zoom.

He has never hated his friends. But in this moment, as they turn their backs on him with their small, empathetic and sorrowful smiles, he hates them. He hates them, in that moment, more than Zoom. And as they leave, a plan appears in his thoughts and he scowls at their backs. He loves them and hates them, and the two opposites make a medium; indifference.

He lets his head drop and a tear rolls down his cheek.

All that power, all that speed, and yet his father lies six feet under the ground. What was the point of it all if he could not save the most important person of his life?

***

Iris proclaims her love for him and he hardly hears the words. Barry of the old would have died to hear those words, but Barry of the new – the speedster of death, someone called him once on TV and he agrees, because wherever he goes, hearts stop – couldn’t care less for a lover.

She takes his hand and hugs him tight. Tells him it’s alright to cry, but that home is where the heart is, and if his is still with her, she’d wait for him.

He waits till she’s gone inside before he shakes his head. His home was with his father and now he is gone; where is he supposed to go now?

He had longed to hear Iris proclaim her love, he had dreamed and visioned it so many times, but love cannot endure everything – no matter what the tales would like one to believe.

At some point, life gets too much and even love breaks at some point. It’s really a fragile thing, just like humans. And his father was what got him going; sure, his friends he loved, Iris he loved, Joe he loved, but his father was the only thing he had left of his old life and of his mother.

You can run as fast as lightning if you have something to run to. Once it had been his mother he ran to, then it was his father he ran to, he ran for – to prove his innocence and once more embrace him. But what do you do when have nothing to run to anymore? What do you do when you lose your purpose in life? What do you do when the last piece of home is gone?

Oh, you run. You run, and run, and run, and run; through space and time, through dimensions and galaxies; you run, and run, and run, and run. 

So that’s what he’ll do. Barry has always been about one thing, and one thing only. Family. And his was gone, his was taken from him, his was six feet under the ground, his was murdered.

He waits till Iris has gone, till she has looked back one last time – a soft smile grazing her lips – and till the door has closed behind her. He sits a little in the silence afterwards, just looking at the street where Joe’s home is; the street he has grown up on. And then he nods to himself, smiles and puts down the cup. The cup will be the only thing left when he has gone.

He has lost his purpose in life, but he still has something to run to.

So he runs, and runs, and runs, and runs, and runs. Through timelines and lives, through different dimensions and planets; entering the speed force as if it is a second part of him. Running, running, running.

To the one, he has always run to, run for.

His mother.

If saving his mother means giving up Iris, means giving up Joe, Cisco, Caitlin, Harry, Eddie, Jessie; he’ll do it. He’ll do it a million times over, for saving his mum, means saving his dad.

Barry has always been about one thing. His family, and he will give up everything to save them; his friendships included.

Nothing and no one could be as important as sparing Nora and Henry Allen from the pain, they had endured in his timeline. This will not happen in this one; in this one, Barry Allen will not know the pain of seeing his parents murdered in front of him. He will not have a darkness inside of him, that cannot be lit, that cannot be removed, that weighs him down every day and makes him scream at night.

So he will put on a mask and a smile and enter every day as if it was another day at a theater scene; his life will be a show but that’s alright, because it means he will see his mum’s red hair and his dad’s carefree smile.

It’ll mean that he would hear _slugger_ one more time and that his mum will praise him for beating up bullies at school even though it’ the other way around.

It’ll mean that maybe one day, in this perfect world, he will heal. He will smile a true smile and no longer feel the pain in his heart at hearing his mother’s scream and his father’s death rattle. He will wake up in the morning, fresh as a seagull because he will no longer hear Zoom’s laughter in his head and see the light disappearing from his parents’ eyes.

He will live his life as an actor and put on a show, because everyone else will be happy and safe. And really, that’s all he has ever wanted. The show must go on and in this world, his pain does not concern anyone but him, for no one else knows of the terrors and the darkness he has saved them from by saving his mother.

What do you do when everything is lost?

You find it again.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope Barry finds happiness with his parents in the new timeline, and I think he deserves it. He might mess with other people's lives, and that's bad, but he has lost so much and I hope he finds a little brightness in the darkness Zoom had left him in.


End file.
